Daniel Ricciardo's "strange" Monaco GP a "weekend to forget"

Ricciardo, Mclaren, Monaco — Photo: © LAT Images

Monaco Grand Prix

Ricciardo's "strange" Monaco GP a "weekend to forget"

Ricciardo finished 12th whilst Norris secured McLaren a podium in Monaco

Ewan Gale

Sunday 23 May 2021 19:41

Daniel Ricciardo has labelled his Monaco Grand Prix experience "strange" and a "weekend to forget" after being lapped by McLaren team-mate Lando Norris.

The Australian has struggled since joining the F1 team at the start of the year but took a step backwards in the Principality, never threatening the points-scoring positions whilst Norris secured a second podium of the season.

Ricciardo revealed he was trying to follow his team-mate's processes through the weekend to build up performance.

"I think the whole weekend was just a weekend to forget for me personally," said Ricciardo.

"Car four [Norris] and the rest of the team got a podium so I obviously want to congratulate them. They got it right.

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"I don't even know if we got it wrong. We just never really got going. We didn't do a crazy-different set-up. I want to say the cars are nearly identical from a set-up point of view.

"I am not trying to be too clever with that either, I have got more to learn with this car than Lando does so I am not trying to be too different, trying to just follow suit and move forward with that.

"Just a strange weekend really from the get-go and one to forget. I am not going to over-analyse this one, just move forward to Baku and go from there."

Ricciardo finished 12th behind both Alfa Romeos and suggested he needed a break in order to process the disappointment instead of dwelling on data and analysis.

"I think this year there have been those races where I am like I have to find a bit more and it will come but this weekend was more of an anomaly with such a big difference," he added.

"Getting lapped might be the first time? I don't really know what to say. I will definitely look into it but when it is a weekend like this and I was as far off as I was, probably best to just step away for a few days."